Black Lace On Sweat
by Cheri-sama
Summary: Hate and attraction are not mutually exclusive.  [MaceCapa]


**Black Lace On Sweat**

_Disclaimer: Not mine, as much as I'd wish ownership of anyone that hot. ._

* * *

After Mace left – after his less then eloquent (and verbal) apology – Corazon laughed and shook her head before returning to her work 

Capa scrubbed a hand over his face and let out a sigh before going back to what he had been doing.

Finally Corazon couldn't hold her silence any longer. Turning her attention away from the life-giving plants that she spent most of her time with, she leaned against the table next to where Capa was working – or pretending to anyway. In truth, he was still agitated about their fight earlier, and had little to no concentration.

"When are you two going to get tired of this dance?" She asked, catching Capa's attention.

"Dance?" Capa looked up from the sheet of calculations in front of him. He had no idea what she was going on about, and right now he was itching to go to the Payload and de-stress. It seemed kind of backwards that being in the presence of enough dark matter to blow up several planets – or restart a sun – relaxed him, but it was science and math. Things that made sense, always, unlike human emotions.

"Mace," she prompted. "You and Mace," she added for further clarification.

"What about me and Mace?" Was she talking about how they were always at each others throats? They couldn't seem to help it though. Everything Mace said seemed to get under his skin and vice versa. It was strange, since the other man was friendly and relaxed with the rest of the crew. He probably resented the fact that Capa wasn't a real astronaut, and was merely on the crew because he was needed for the Payload.

It wasn't that Capa thought Mace was stupid. He wouldn't be on the mission if he was. He was more than capable of keeping the Icarus II in top shape. But Mace's brand of intelligence – as well as his strict military upbringing – was at the other end of the spectrum from Capa's number-based physics. They had nothing in common, and might as well be as far apart as Pluto and the sun.

Corazon rolled her eyes. Was Capa really that slow? She looked him over, noting the bewildered expression in those beautiful blue eyes. Okay, so maybe he _was_ that oblivious… after all, he wasn't exactly top notch in person to person relations.

"You're attracted to him," she spelt out, watching Capa's eyes go impossibly wide as a deep flush spread over his pale and freckled skin.

Capa finally managed to choke out, "You think I'm in love with _Mace_ of all people?"

She couldn't help but laugh at the gob smacked expression on his face. When she finally regained her composure, she spoke. "That's not what I said. I said you're attracted to him, and he to you. That's why you can't be around each other for more than five minutes before you're both bristling with male pride and the fists start flying. You want each other physically – even if neither of you will admit it – but since you don't even _like_ each other emotionally, you can't accept it."

As Capa considered her words, his mind sifted through all his actions and interactions with the crew's mechanic. It was true that a lot of their altercations were physical, but he had merely chalked it up to strained tempers and close quarters. Sharing the same small spaces with people for almost two years without a chance to step outside and take a breather made tensions and tempers run higher than normal over the smallest things.

It would never have occurred to him that their fights were merely the only way they knew how to be physical when it had obviously not occurred to either of them that they _wanted_ anything physical between them.

He felt his cheeks grow hot once more, and knew he must have been blushing again from the amused look on Corazon's face.

"Does Mace know?" He asked her, wondering if she had talked to him as well.

Corazon shook her head. "He's as clueless as you are. It's all kind of cute really, except when you break stuff with your fights," she added.

Using both hands to push his overlong hair back away from his face, he let out a succinct, "Well… shit," before shooting a panicked look at Corazon that screamed 'what do I do now?' without him actually having to say it.

She merely shrugged before turning back to her plants. "Just make sure you're not around anything fragile if you _do_ do something about it." She said; a grin that Capa couldn't see coloring her words.

_Some help she is_, Capa thought as he stared blankly at the work in front of him. And it was all her fault too. If she hadn't said something, he could have gone on deluding himself that he merely disliked Mace. Instead, now he wasn't sure if he'd be able to look Mace in the face now without thinking back on Corazon's words. _"You're attracted to him." Well… shit._

Snapping up the clipboard with its sheets of calculations, he stormed out of the oxygen garden's workspace and made his way to where the Payload was kept. Punching in his access code took two tries, the first time his fingers shook so much – with rage? – that he miss-keyed in the code. Once the door slid open to allow him inside, he tossed the clipboard aside and slid down to sit on the floor, leaning his head back against the cool metal wall.

Why had Corazon bothered to say something, after all this time too? Did she think their impending approach to the sun – and most likely impending doom, if he was allowed to sound dramatic – would give him the devil-may-care attitude to act on this so-called attraction? And was she even right? _Was_ he attracted to Mace?

Closing his eyes and sighing, he allowed his mind to dredge up Mace's image, not slovenly and unshaven as he was today, but with neat close-cropped hair and a smooth-shaven jaw. How he had looked when they had first met before boarding the Icarus.

Sure, Mace wasn't hard on the eyes. He was slimly muscled, while still larger than Capa who was wiry at best. His hands were large and capable, allowing him to hold his tools with ease as he kept all of the Icarus's many machines running as they glided through space.

Mentally disrobing the mechanic – he had caught enough glances in the shower to fuel his imagination – he imagined running his hands over those muscles, what Mace would look like flushed with passion.

Feeling himself grow hard, he jerked his eyes open – and his mind away from those thoughts – with a harsh growl of exhaled breath. _Fuck._ Corazon was right. He was attracted to Mace. While it didn't mean he wanted to pick out china patterns, it did mean he wouldn't be adverse to being fucked into oblivion by the other man.

_Bad thought_, he groaned as his cock pulsed. He tried to direct his mind to less… stimulating thoughts, like Kaneda's cooking, or calculating logarithms. It was no good getting his body excited over something that would never happen. Even if _he_ admitted he wouldn't mind a good fuck with the good-looking mechanic, he highly doubted Mace would agree.

"Capa!"

Capa's eyelids flew open – when had he closed them? – as Mace's voice echoed through the 'com. Speak of the devil and he shall appear…

Adjusting his too tight pants, he stood up to reach the 'com button to reply, proud of how in control his voice sounded, even as he was still aroused from his mental voyeurism. "What, Mace? You already apologized."

"I know. Let me in, I want to talk to you."

Capa stared at Mace's image on the 'com. Taking a deep breath, he exhaled slowly and said, "Fine, but make it quick." Pressing the button to allow the other man access to the Payload rooms, he turned his back on the door and rested one hand on the desktop, supporting his weight while he ran the other hand through his hair nervously.

As Mace stepped through the door and into the room, he paused for a moment just to look at Capa. He may not have been a psychiatrist like Searle, but he could tell by the set of the other man's shoulders that he was severely agitated.

"What do you want, Mace?" Capa asked, not turning around. He was running the numbers for the calculations of the Payload in his head in an attempt to keep his focus away from the other man. _"You're attracted to him." Stupid Corazon, why couldn't she just let me stay in obliviousness? _The last thing he needed to do was something stupid, like jumping him and demanding sex.

Wait, why was that a bad plan again? Oh yeah, because Mace would most likely beat him to a pulp…

"I—" Mace frowned. He didn't like talking to the back of the other man's head. Moving on silent feet to stand behind Capa, he grabbed one arm in a firm grip and forced the physicist to turn and look at him.

Capa's heart raced as he was forced to face Mace, and his breathing grew quicker as he struggled to keep his body under control. This was all Corazon's fault. If she hadn't opened his eyes, he wouldn't be in this position.

Blue eyes darted around the room, looking everywhere but at Mace.

"Why won't you look at me?" Mace asked, frowning. Capa was acting weird. Well, weirder than normal. The anti-social scientist had always seemed strange to Mace. While he didn't hate Capa, he didn't exactly like him either. Not for anything the other man had ever done – or not done – just for some indefinable reason that probably wouldn't exist were they not stuck together on a spaceship, years from home.

His words made those startling eyes focus on Mace finally.

"No reason, what do you want?" Capa repeated, hoping to finish this conversation quickly. Why did Mace have to stand so close? One more step and he'd be pressed flush against his own body, and able to feel the hard-on that Capa couldn't get to subside, no matter what boring things he thought about, especially now with the object of his recent lustful thoughts invading his personal space. Capa noticed that he'd shaved and trimmed his hair, now looking more like the man he had first met then the wild thing he had become as time had passed on the ship.

Mace continued to frown, noticing that while Capa was now looking in his direction, he was also looking at some point around his chin as if to avoid eye contact. His full lips were drawn tight into an almost petulant pout that made things low in Mace's belly contract with heat. _What the hell? Tell me I didn't just think Capa's lips were hot._ He shoved those thoughts away, trying to remember why he had come to speak with the other man.

"Well?" Capa prodded, finally meeting his gaze. "Are you going to say something or just stand there and stare at me?" Blue eyes surrounded by thick lashes seemed to stare right through Mace as if Capa knew exactly what he had just been thinking about. And while he didn't know Mace's exact thoughts, the other man didn't exactly guard his expressions. He had been staring at Capa's mouth before his face had tightened and his frown had deepened as if he didn't like where his own thoughts were going.

_Well hell, maybe Mace's eyes are opening too…_ Capa thought as the older man stood there silently.

"Mace?" Deciding to see how far he could push this, after all, the worse that happened was they got into a fist fight again, he moved away from the desk, covering half the space between them so that they almost brushed against each other.

"What are you doing, Capa?" Mace's voice wavered as the physicist closed some of the space between him. Why wasn't he stepping back? And why did he suddenly want to know if Capa's lips were as soft as they looked?

Those lips curved upwards into a cheeky smile as he took another half-step closer. What the hell, they were probably all going to die in this mission anyway.

"What do you want me to be doing, Mace?" Capa replied, his voice lowered to a soft sound that seemed like it wouldn't go anywhere but straight to Mace's ears – among other places.

Mace's hand on Capa's arm tightened convulsively, causing the smaller man to wince, but not to stop his sudden gamble at seduction. The fact that Mace wasn't running away or beating the shit out of him meant either that he was too stunned to do either, or that he wasn't interested in doing either.

Licking suddenly dry lips, Mace lifted his other hand to grasp Capa's other arm, and pulled the physicist forward to close the small space between them. With Capa pressed against him like this, he could feel the younger man's chest rise and fall with rapid breaths, as well as the hefty erection he was sporting.

Capa tilted his head back to stare up at Mace, but didn't fight the grip on his arms. Raising himself onto his toes, he pressed his lips to Mace's. At first, Mace was unresponsive, stunned. The fact that Capa was aroused for _him_, _by_ him, had come completely out of left field. He couldn't deny though, when he felt his own groin grow heavy, that his body wasn't exactly against the idea.

While he didn't _like_ Capa, he had to admit that the man was prettier then any guy had the right to be. Coming to a decision, he returned Capa's tentative kiss fiercely. Their lips pressed together in frantic fury as the same energy that fueled their fights boiled to the surface.

Capa let out a moan as Mace finally reacted, kissing him as if he could eat Capa up from the inside out, as the larger man shuffled him back a few steps so that he was once more pressed into the hard edge of the desktop. While uncomfortable, it did nothing to lessen the state of arousal he was in.

With Mace gripping his upper arms like Capa was suddenly going to try and go somewhere, the only mobility he had with his arms was from the elbow downwards. Deciding to take advantage of that, he slid his hands underneath the hem of Mace's shirt and felt a thrill of satisfaction as he felt the tight muscles of the other man's stomach contract under the delicate touch of his fingers.

Mace bit down hard on Capa's lower lip as he felt thin fingers slide across his belly and tease along the edge of his pants. At the skinny scientist's sharp gasp of pain from the bite, he grinned. Who said fighting and fucking had to be mutually exclusive?

Leaning forward to bend Capa backwards on the desk, he ground his hips against Capa's, muffling a wanton moan in the curve where the physicist's neck met his shoulder, biting down a little gentler this time.

As Capa arched his back, he tried to lift his legs to wrap them around Mace's waist. Instead, all succeeded in doing was scrabbling at the back of the man's calves with sneaker shod feet.

"Dammit, Capa," Mace hissed after being repeatedly kicked, "Take your fucking shoes off or stop that."

"Then let go of my fucking arms, you moron. I'm not going to run away. We're on a_spaceship_." Capa replied, glaring up at Mace.

Mace glanced down at where his hands gripped Capa's arms with bruising force – Capa frowned, he was going to have to wear long sleeved shirts for days to hide the marks – as if he couldn't remember when he had grabbed them. Letting the scientist go, he backed up enough to be able to wrap his hands around Capa's waist and lift him onto the desktop.

Startled, Capa clung to Mace's shoulders for a moment before the man bent down, breaking Capa's hold on him easily and grabbing hold of one skinny ankle, tugged the shoe off and tossed it aimlessly behind him. When he moved to remove the other shoe, he was rewarded by a not-so-gentle kick to the side of the head by a socked foot.

"Watch where you're throwing those you oaf, I have important things in here that I don't need you to be breaking." Capa was the one to grin this time at Mace's thunderous expression.

Setting the other shoe down in an overly dramatic gesture, Mace stood back up and settled himself between Capa's spread legs. Pulling the physicist forward so that he was pressed tight against Mace's own body – and barely balanced on the edge of the desk – Mace buried his hands in Capa's own overlong hair and tugged their mouths together with a sharp pull.

Capa winced slightly at the pain that flared in his scalp, but was soon swept away by the ferocity of Mace's kiss. All the emotion and anger that the other man had held for him earlier today was still there, simmering below the surface, and it was merely letting itself out in a different way.

Curling his now bare feet around the back of Mace's legs, he pressed himself tight against the other man, a breathless sound escaping him as he felt the other man's erection pressed against his own, separated only by layers of cloth. Rolling his hips, he rubbed himself against Mace like a cat in heat, only thinking of coming, no matter how it happened.

Mace pulled his mouth away from Capa's, "Fuck, Capa. If you do that, I'm going to come inside my pants." He looked down at the other man's face, noting the glazed expression in those blue eyes. "And so are you."

"Don't care," Capa said on an exhaled breath, not stilling the quickening grind of his cock against Mace's. "Need to come, now, please…" He let out a noise that sounded suspiciously like a whimper when Mace backed away – or tried too… it was hard (no pun intended) with Capa clinging to him like a limpet.

"Capa…" Mace groaned and gave up trying to get away and instead used his weight as an advantage, pressing Capa back onto the desk, his fingers still twined in lanky brown locks. He did his best to keep his hips still as he molested the other man's mouth with his own, but despite being out-weighed and trapped, Capa continued to writhe and press against Mace, anxious mewling noises and pants escaping full pink lips in between kisses.

"Jesus—" Capa gasped as he came – as Mace predicted – in his pants. His thin chest heaved as he tried to catch his breath. He could still feel Mace hard and pressed against him, and a small grin curved his mouth as he slid one hand down Mace's chest, and under the waistband of his pants.

"Capa…" Mace's hips jerked as cool, thin fingers slid across his belly and wrapped around his cock.

"Is that all you can say?" Capa murmured, as he stroked Mace firmly, watching with an amused expression as Mace's eyes slid shut and his hands left Capa's hair to prop himself up on the desktop. His mouth was slightly open as he gasped, getting closer to orgasm with every hard stroke of Capa's hand.

It was amazing how easy it was to bring another man to climax, after all, it wasn't that much different then masturbating; albeit a lot more fun to watch, Capa mused as he watched Mace finally collapse into orgasm.

Flicking his thumb overtop the sensitive head of Mace's penis, he was rewarded with a low growl and a, "Fuck, Capa…"

Mace looked up in time to see Capa bring his hand thoughtfully to his lips, tentatively licking a pearly drop of semen off one finger. The mechanic swore if it had been at all possible, he would have come again just from that unintentionally erotic sight.

Moving away from the smaller man after giving him time to adjust his precarious perch on the desktop so that he didn't slide to the floor on boneless legs – who wouldn't admit to Mace that it was the best orgasm he'd had in nearly two years, after all, sex with yourself was fine once in a while, but nothing beat the real thing – Mace looked around the small room for a rag or something to clean up with.

Spying nothing, he looked down at his shirt for a moment, weighing the pros of cleaning them both up, to the cons of having to walk back from the Payload shirtless and having to explain to anyone he ran into why he was so… un-attired.

Comfort won out over decency and he whipped off his shirt, cleaning himself up before tossing the soiled shirt at Capa who caught it one handed. Mace averted his gaze at the image of the other man sprawled there looking thoroughly debauched and a little too pleased with himself.

"So what did you want, anyway?" Capa asked as he cleaned up, a momentary frown curving his lips as he noticed the soiled state of his pants. Sliding off the desk, he wobbled for a moment, glad that Mace wasn't facing him. Once he was sure his legs would hold him, he turned to a small metal locker built into the underside of one of the countertops and tugged out a clean pair of medical-style scrub pants.

Mace turned back just as Capa – with his back to him – pushed down his semen-stained pants and kicked them away, standing naked from the waist down for a moment before he pulled on the clean pants.

Swallowing heavily, _why does such a skinny guy have such a tight round ass? _Mace thought, before he tried to regroup his scattered thoughts. "What did I want?"

"Yeah," Capa turned around, "You wanted to talk to me. It's why you came here?"

Mace blinked slowly, trying to remember what had been so urgent that had made him seek Capa out in person so soon after his botched apology.

"You have no idea, do you? Whatever, tell me later." Capa replied. "You should go get a shirt on before someone comes around here and wants to know what you were doing in the Payload shirtless. Oh, and if you see Corazon, say thank you for me."

Mace frowned at being summarily dismissed, Capa having already turned back to his work. _What's Cory got to do with anything?_ Annoyed, but too tired to drum up the anger that had burned in him before, he stormed out of the Payload and back to his claustrophobic sleeping quarters to get a clean shirt.

In the Payload work room, Capa stopped pretending to work, and let out a shaky sigh. Staring at his soiled pants and Mace's shirt that lay on the floor, he leaned down to scoop them up, stuffing them in the locker for now. What the hell had he been thinking? That one good orgasm – and fuck, had it been good – would change their relationship?

He still didn't like the other man much and it was obvious that Mace wasn't going to start spouting sonnets and giving roses, though Capa would admit that would just be kind of creepy.

On the other hand, the physicist wondered if he hadn't just opened a whole new can of worms. Now if they fucked instead of fought – or if earlier was any indication – they fucked as well as fought, it wasn't likely to make them get along any better. Although, Mace did seem a lot more mellow after coming. Maybe an orgasm was the cure for all around grumpiness?

Smirking to himself, Capa quickly lost himself back in his work, deciding to deal with things as they came… no pun intended.


End file.
